Chương 3
“Yes,” he said.
The officer waited.
“I thought she hurt my wife. I grabbed her and twisted her arm behind her back.”
“Did she strike you?”
“No.”
“Did she threaten you?”
“No.”
“Did she resist?”
“No.”
Across the room, Margaret glanced at him.
Ethan looked down at the island.
The officer asked whether Margaret wanted to make a complaint. The question was directed to her, but Ethan felt the entire room listening.
Margaret rubbed the side of her wrist with her thumb.
“No.”
The officer explained that the decision was not entirely hers if evidence supported an offense. Margaret answered that she understood. Her voice held the patient chill she usually reserved for customer-service representatives and men who explained her own bank statements to her.
Claire left in an ambulance because she had become dizzy when she tried to stand. Noah stayed in her arms after the paramedics confirmed he appeared uninjured. Margaret rode with them.
Ethan remained behind with the police.
The house looked larger after they left.
A detective named Lena Ortiz arrived just before midnight. She wore plain clothes beneath a dark rain jacket, though there had been no rain. She photographed the documents, placed Ethan’s phone in an evidence bag after receiving his written consent, and listened to the voicemail twice through Margaret’s device.
The first twelve seconds contained only movement and breath. Then Lucas’s voice emerged.
Don’t fight me. Leave bruises. Ethan will blame his mother.
After that came Claire saying, Get off me.
A cabinet door struck something.
Lucas whispered, You should’ve signed.
The recording ended.
Ortiz did not react visibly. She asked Margaret to forward the original voicemail without altering or trimming it. She asked Ethan whether the phrase you should’ve signed meant anything.
He looked at the papers.
“No.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’ve never seen those.”
“Your signature appears on at least four pages.”
“I didn’t sign them.”
“Then we’ll need to establish that.”
Her tone was neither accusing nor reassuring. Ethan found himself wishing she would choose one.
“What happens now?” he asked.
“We locate your brother. We document your wife’s injuries. We preserve the devices and financial records. You contact your bank’s fraud department and an attorney in the morning.”
“Can you freeze the transfers?”
“The bank may be able to stop or recall some funds. That isn’t something I can promise.”
“He assaulted my wife.”
“That allegation is being investigated.”
“You heard the recording.”
“I did.”
“So arrest him.”
“We have to find him first.”
The answer was obvious. Ethan disliked her for giving it.
He disliked himself more for needing someone to blame.
Ortiz placed the baby monitor in a separate bag. Its screen had gone dark, but the upstairs camera’s storage card might contain motion clips. She warned him not to access the cloud account until a forensic technician advised them, then asked whether Lucas knew the password.
“I don’t know.”
She paused.
“You’re going to hear yourself say that often over the next few days,” she said. “Try not to fill the gaps with guesses.”
After the police left, Ethan stood in the kitchen until the refrigerator motor stopped and the silence became complete.
The wooden spoon remained on the floor.
He picked it up and set it beside the sink. One edge of the bowl had chipped when it struck the tile. Margaret had bought the spoon years earlier, part of a cheap set she had brought over after Claire complained that Ethan used metal utensils on nonstick pans.
He nearly threw it away.
Instead, he left it where it was.
At two in the morning, Claire sent him a message from Margaret’s phone.
Noah is fine. I have a mild concussion. We are staying with your mother tonight. Do not come over.
Ethan read the message four times.
He typed, I’m sorry.
Then deleted it.
He typed, I love you.
That seemed worse.
He finally wrote, I understand. I’ll bring anything you need and leave it outside.
Claire did not answer.
At six fifteen, Ethan called the bank.
By seven, he had spoken to three departments and repeated his identity so many times that his name began to sound fraudulent. The business accounts were restricted. Two outgoing transfers had not yet settled and might be stopped. Four others had cleared over the previous nine days.
The total missing was one hundred eighty-six thousand four hundred dollars.
Payroll was due Friday.
Cole Restoration employed eighteen people, not counting Ethan and Lucas. Most of them had children, mortgages, truck payments, or some combination of the three. Ethan knew who needed overtime to cover a daughter’s community-college tuition and who had missed two days because his mother’s chemotherapy schedule changed. He knew which employee always cashed his check during lunch and which one left it folded in his wallet until Sunday.
He had never imagined money as numbers on a screen until the screen told him the money was gone.
At eight thirty, his project supervisor called to ask why the company debit card had declined at a lumberyard.
Ethan told him to use his personal card and save the receipt.
“Everything okay?” the man asked.
“No.”
There was a pause.
“You need me at the office?”
“Yes.”
Ethan drove there without showering.
Cole Restoration occupied a converted auto-parts warehouse near the interstate. The front office had gray vinyl floors, fluorescent lights, and a reception counter Lucas had designed himself. He had insisted on reclaimed wood because, according to him, clients wanted contractors who looked expensive but still knew what a hammer was.
His desk sat behind a glass partition.
A coffee cup remained beside his keyboard. The words WORLD’S OKAYEST UNCLE were printed across the front.
May you like
Ethan stood there longer than necessary.
Margaret had worked in the same office for eleven years, first for Ethan’s father and later for Ethan. She had handled payroll, insurance renewals, supplier accounts, and every unglamorous detail that kept the company alive. Eighteen months earlier, she had begun questioning payments to Northline Supply.
